The regenerative capacity of injured adult central nervous system (CNS) tissue is very limited. Specifically, traumatic spinal cord injury (SCI) leads to permanent loss of motor and sensory functions below the site of injury, as well as other detrimental complications. A potential regenerative strategy is stem cell transplantation; however, cell survival is typically less than 1%. To improve cell survival, stem cells can be delivered in a biomaterial matrix that provides an environment conducive to survival after transplantation. One major challenge in this approach is to define the biomaterial and cell strategies in vitro. To this end, we investigated both peptide-modification of gellan gum and olfactory ensheathing glia (OEG) on neural stem/progenitor cell (NSPC) fate. To enhance cell adhesion, the gellan gum (GG) was modified using Diels-Alder click chemistry with a fibronectin-derived synthetic peptide (GRGDS). Amino acid analysis demonstrated that approximately 300 nmol of GRGDS was immobilized to each mg of GG. The GG-GRGDS had a profound effect on NSPC morphology and proliferation, distinct from that of NSPCs in GG alone, demonstrating the importance of GRGDS for cell-GG interaction. To further enhance NSPC survival and outgrowth, they were cultured with OEG. Here NSPCs interacted extensively with OEG, demonstrating significantly greater survival and proliferation relative to monocultures of NSPCs. These results suggest that this co-culture strategy of NSPCs with OEG may have therapeutic benefit for SCI repair.
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